What is this?

Hello, and welcome to the Community-based Lobster Acquisition Workforce (C.L.A.W.)! This is a project I’m conducting with the hope of learning more about the biology of lobster mushrooms. I’m an Ecology, Evolution, and Organismal Biology PhD student in a mycology lab at the University of Utah in Salt Lake City (incidentally, no lobster specimens have been recorded from the state of Utah, although the common host Russula brevipes occurs here). My interest in fungi actually started with lichens while I was an undergrad, and has expanded to include all sorts of fungal phenomena. I’m especially interested in insect-fungus interactions, as well as mycoparasitism (fungi parasitizing other fungi). At this point, I’m still at the beginning of my graduate work and exploring several different possible directions for the research that will become my thesis, as well as learning a lot about mushrooms!

            “Lobster mushrooms” are a popular edible mushroom endemic to North America, easily spotted on the forest floor due to their bright orange coloration. Rather than being a distinct organism themselves, they are actually a parasitic association formed of a mold, Hypomyces lactifluorum, attacking mushroom hosts in the genera Russula and Lactarius. Common hosts are white-colored and unpalatable when not under attack. When Hypomyces invades, it grows over the outside of the host sporocarp (the fruiting body that grows aboveground, recognizable as a mushroom) and releases spores formed through sexual reproduction. Hypomyces belongs to a major evolutionary group of fungi called Ascomycota, which contains many molds, as well as some species with large fruiting bodies such as morels, whereas Russula and Lactarius hosts are in the Basidiomycota group, which contains most of the fungi we would consider mushrooms. This means that Hypomyces and its hosts are very distantly related within Kingdom Fungi.

            This project aims to categorize the diversity of both parasite and host. When we see a fruiting body that looks like a lobster, is the parasite always Hypomyces lactifluorum, and are the hosts the members of the genera Russula and Lactarius that have already been established as targets of the parasite? Are white morphs of Hypomyces lactifluorum a genetically distinct group, and/or found on different hosts than the common orange? Maybe certain genetic subgroups of the parasite will be associated at a high rate with specific hosts, or another type of fungus (or even a bacterium) will be found to consistently associate with the lobster sporocarp. Hopefully, we will uncover hidden diversity and amass a data set large enough for interesting patterns to emerge.